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Sunday, November 15, 2009

Jane Hirshfield and the Skagit River Poetry Festival - May 22nd...

“Good poetry begins with seeing increasingly clearly, in increasingly various ways; but another part of poetry’s true perception is found only in relinquishing more and more of the self to more and more of the world.”

I came across this quote today and it states so succinctly what I believe about poetry - and about living a creative life. And what I want this blog to encompass. I've started to expound on this, but I think the quote works best if I just say a big YES. Yes, to being in the world and letting those perceptions: images, ideas, songs, bits of cut glass come through me into the poem. Yes, to use a kitchen metaphor: Let poets be the sifters of the world. What's a better word for sifter? Flour, sugar, image, and imagination.

Thank you, Sandy. I hope to make this a blog that's worthwhile. I'll be posting about how to apply to writers' residencies and about the poet Madeline DeFree's 90th Birthday party at Elliott Bay Books a little later in the week. I am so glad you found me here.

You are my on-line ideal, so that's high praise. I will try to find a way, perhaps with your help, to bring these posts to Red Room. But The Alchemist's Kitchen is going to be the main show. Something about choosing the colors and all the elements makes it seem more mine. Thanks so much for signing on.

Susan Rich is the author
of four collections of poetry, most recently, Cloud Pharmacy and The Alchemist’s Kitchen, which was a Finalist for the Foreword
Prize and the Washington State Book Award. Her other books include Cures Include Travel (2006)
and The Cartographer’s Tongue /
Poems of the World (2000) which won the PEN USA Award for Poetry and
the Peace Corps Writers Book Award. She is the recipient of awards from
Artist’s Trust, 4Culture, The Times Literary Supplement of London, Seattle
Mayors Office of Arts and Cultural Affairs, and the Fulbright Foundation. Susan's poems have been published in many journals including: Antioch Review, Gettysburg Review, Harvard Review, and The Southern Review.

Currently, she is Professor of Creative Writing and Film Studies at Highline College, outside of Seattle, WA.. Susan also works as the poetry editor for The Human journal based in
Istanbul, Turkey and along with Kelli Russell Agodon is founder of Poets on the Coast: A Writing Retreat for
Women. She is one of the editors of the anthology, The Strangest of Theatres: Poets Writing Across Borders published
by McSweeney’s and the Poetry Foundation (2013). Susan lives in Seattle,
WA and writes in the House of Sky, a few blocks from the Puget Sound.